This application relates to laser surgery including laser ophthalmic surgery.
Laser-induced photodisruption is widely used in laser ophthalmic surgery. Various ophthalmic laser surgical systems based on photodisruption use relatively long pulse duration lasers in single shot or burst modes. For example, an Nd:YAG laser may be used to generate a laser beam with a series of a few pulses, e.g., approximately three sequential laser pulses in some procedures. In surgical procedures using such laser devices the average laser power of the surgical laser beam delivered to the eye is low and the average power of the residual light of the surgical laser beam that reaches the retina or other structures in the eye can be below the threshold power level that can cause injury to the retina or other structures.
In some surgical procedures, even if hundreds of laser pulses are placed, these are often placed with a lower precision, e.g., on the order of hundreds of microns.
Thus, laser pulses often have low impact energy and are sufficiently widely spaced so that the risk of thermal or photic injury to the retina and other structures adjacent to an intended surgical target by such laser pulses is low and no special precautions for protecting the retina may be required when operating these laser surgical systems.